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Jordan Fish on Novation and Focusrite for Bring Me The Horizon

25 Feb 2014

Leading the resurgence of British metal, Sheffield metalcore band Bring Me The Horizon are a force to be reckoned with. The quintet arrived on the scene in 2004, and since winning Kerrang’s Best British Newcomer award in 2006 they’ve released four studio albums, the latest being “Sempiternal” on Sony's RCA Records which topped the Australian album chart and entered the UK album chart at number 3. In 2013 alone, the band have brought their powerful anthems to Reading and Leeds Festival, Rock Am Ring, Sonisphere, the Vans Warped Tour where they recently headlined, and two of their own UK and Europe tours to name just a few - they'll be embarking on a US headline tour in early 2014.

Jordan Fish, programmer and keys player, uses Novation and Focusrite both on stage and in the studio - we caught up with him before their Brixton Academy headline show to chat about his setup and more.

Jordan’s DAW of choice for live is Ableton Live, which he has running on his laptop off to the side of his setup on a rack. His setup runs out of two Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 interfaces – one of these runs the tracks, interludes and click for the rest of the band, and the other is used for his keyboard sounds which are run through Ableton. On stage, Jordan uses a Novation Launchpad S at the forefront of his setup to launch clips and scenes on Ableton, a keyboard, a Roland SPDS, Roland PD8 drum pads and a floor tom.

Back in the studio, Jordan uses two Scarlett 8i6 interfaces (one of which was used to demo all of the vocals on the latest album), the ISA 430 MkII channel strip and ISA 828 mic preamp. He uses a Novation Impulse MIDI controller keyboard for writing:

"It’s the best feeling MIDI controller on the market. A lot of the things I play are synth lines, sometimes more piano type sounds, and for me it was the best feeling middle ground keyboard. The keys on the Impulse feel solid but it doesn’t feel like a piano necessarily, because that’s not really what I wanted."

Build quality is the most important feature for Jordan when choosing his studio gear, and the ISA 430 MkII fit the bill for him perfectly. Featuring a set of classic Focusrite heritage elements including the classic ISA transformer-based mic pre, EQ, dynamics and A-D converter, as well as the ability to access these elements individually, the ISA 430 MkII is an extremely versatile analogue channel strip. Jordan plans on using his to record vocals for the band’s next album – “it’s just really well made, and sounds really good.”

“It’s the same with the Saffire Pro 40s – they’re just well-constructed, and they don’t break very easily which is very handy and most important when you’re on tour. And they sound good too. To be honest, the Saffire Pro 40 is quite cheap too for what it is – if you compare it to the other similar products with the same number of outputs, price-wise, it’s the best thing you can get for your money.”

Jordan also takes a Scarlett 8i6 on tour with him too - small, compact, portable and housing two high quality, award-winning Focusrite preamps, it's the ideal solution for impromptu recording or demoing whilst on the road.